The Cy Young Award winner, English major, humanitarian, knuckleballer, author and the Blue Jays potential Opening Day starter met the Toronto media for the first time Tuesday since the trade with the Mets.

But is he also self-centred and a self promoter? Those observations still sting and cling from his exit from New York — forcing Dickey to apologize to Mets fans during the conference call.

Talk in New York regarding lingering, negative reports of his character amplified after a team Christmas party last week. Dickey said at the party that he was disappointed by the pace of his contract talks, and that he would leave the Mets if he played next year without that extension.

“I knew that was coming and I want to answer as honestly as I can,” Dickey said.

“You hear something at the Christmas party and it turns out I wasn’t prepared, I wasn’t aware that I would be put in that position, it was just a conversation and it became much larger. And I feel badly to use that time to become emotional, and I want to apologize for that. I feel my emotions were warranted, but that was the wrong time for that. I wasn’t ready for what was to happen there.

“As for the articles,” Dickey continued, “the clubhouse stuff . . . my response is go ask my teammates. Were there any quotes there coming out, I’m not sure because I didn’t read everything, and I’m not saying what was written wasn’t true, as much as it was posturing and opinions about what someone thinks they see from the outside. The Mets gave me an opportunity to rebuild a career and there’s a lot of gratitude on my part. I don’t want it to ever be a place where I won’t feel comfortable coming back, because that isn’t the case.”

Dickey also dealt with several other subjects — his learning curve with the knuckleball, and his trepidation with revealing details in his book about child abuse in his past.

But thoughts will now turn to Dickey the pitcher, the tremendous story behind his success and where he will fit into the Jays rotation.

Given his status as a defending Cy Young Award winner, and ability to work past 200 innings pitched, he seems a natural to lead the Jays staff. The Jays may also want him to be the Opening Day starter at home against Cleveland since they will likely want Dickey and whoever is at the top of the rotation to pitch in the second series of the season against Boston.

The rotation may also focus as much on who follows Dickey, as to where the knuckleballer pitches. While it’s not something to bank on, there is the expectation the starter who follows a knuckleballer in the rotation could have a great season (the Mets have also shown a high percentage winning record in games against the same team following a Dickey start).

If that holds true, then it may be possible to see Dickey lead the staff, followed by the hard-throwing Brandon Morrow. Lefty Mark Buehrle could be third, followed by Josh Johnson (who has only one year left on his contract) and Ricky Romero in the fifth slot.

Dickey certainly wasn’t concerned about where he falls in the pecking order, as much as he was about “pitching his guts out” for Jays fans, and delivering the consistency he has developed over the past three seasons.

He even felt a special affinity for Toronto, its culturally diverse makeup, and the fact Jays GM Alex Anthopoulos’s “from the heart” meeting with him in Nashville last weekend left him feeling wanted.

“I got to meet the leader of the organization and I felt wanted, I was told that I’d make a difference, that my contribution would be to something special that was going to happen in Toronto . . . it was the first time I sat across from somebody in baseball and they told me something like that,” Dickey said.

There was a measure of respect in Anthopoulos’s meeting that Dickey felt was due to a knuckleballer. He is the only active knuckleballer in the big leagues, and saw the Jays as an open-minded franchise willing to tap one of baseball’s oddest pitches.

“The front office, maybe not so much. The reputation is a knuckleball pitcher, he’s . . . well, lets put it this way, when people want out of a game because a knuckleball guy is pitching, that is a measure of respect and it happens in the game a lot.”

Among the many revelations in his autobiography Wherever I Wind Up: My Quest for Truth, Authenticity and the Perfect Knuckleball, released in 2011, was that he was abused as a child.

“I want to tell the truth and I want to be as honest as I can,” Dickey said of his book, which became a New York Times bestseller.

“And to be honest, I had a lot of fear releasing a book like that, not a baseball book as much as it is a book about life. A lot of darkness and fear, and I bared my soul. I’m so thankful the way it was received, and the way teammates responded. They were curious about my experience and I had teammates share experiences with me that they had not shared with anyone before.”

“It was cathartic for me,” Dickey added.

“It allowed me a sense of freedom I had never experienced as a player and a person. It allowed me to express myself and to look to God, and I was able to embrace the knuckleball in my career, I really feel the book was instrumental in that.”

In the meantime, the 38-year-old felt he could help with leadership, and stressed his belief that the Jays have a strong “culture of winning.”

“My style is to lead on the field and I’m always available,” Dickey said.

“That’s what was done for me in my career. If you don’t have people to trust, then I wouldn’t be here talking to you (media) right now. And I’ve still got a lot to learn. I’m hungry to learn and I’m still passionate about my craft. Pitching in a winning clubhouse is what I’m most passionate about, I think we have a winning culture here, I really do.”

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